QPR 'battle' to keep star amid Hull City interest as Alex Neil delivers Millwall reality check

A huge injury time winner from Lucas Andersen helps put to bed relegation fears for QPR ahead of the final three fixtures of the Championship campaign.

The R’s are now 10 points clear of the drop zone in 14th place and another season of Championship football is secured. Meanwhile, Millwall suffered a 4-1 defeat at the hands of Blackburn Rovers to see their hopes of a play-off spot drift slightly further away.

Alex Neil’s reaction to defeat at Ewood Park and the latest QPR transfer talk features in your Saturday round-up from the second tier.

Alex Neil provides Millwall play-off reality check

Millwall head coach Alex Neil provided a reality check following defeat to Blackburn Rovers on Friday afternoon. The Lions fell to a 4-1 loss in a big blow to the side’s outside chances at securing a place in the play-off spots come the end of the season.

The hosts took the lead after 42 minutes through Dominic Hyam but Millwall replied two minutes later through Mihailo Ivanovic. That goal looked to have levelled up the fixture but Blackburn Rovers found a second through Sondre Tronstad to change Neil’s half-time team talk.

Speaking after the game, Neil assessed where his Millwall side is at amid talk of a play-off push. He told the BBC: “What we need to recognise is, we’re still a work in progress, we’ve still got a lot of work to do. I think what shows that more than anything else, we’ve gone 11 games out of 16 we’ve won 1-0. We’ve not been going to teams and beating them in 3s and 4s.

“I’m not taking anything away from what we’ve done, we’ve done remarkably well, particularly with what we’ve had to contend with [injuries]. We’ve got a long way to go as individuals and as a team and that’s something we are trying to develop. Today is certainly a setback. There are mitigating circumstances with injuries, but we still felt in the game. There was enough there for us and if we took our chances at the right moments it could have been very different.”

He added: “My biggest disappointment at the end of the match was that we lacked a bit of belief at that stage, that’s a frustration for me because that’s not a nice sight to have as a coach, but I think they understood the magnitude of the goal at that point.”

QPR ‘battle’ Hull City and Blackburn Rovers transfer interest

QPR ‘face a battle’ to hold on to centre-back Morgan Fox past the end of this season with Championship rivals circling over the player, who is out of contract at Loftus Road come the end of the campaign.

That’s according to EFL Analysis, who name Blackburn Rovers and Hull City as clubs interested in the 31-year-old, who signed a two-year deal when arriving at QPR on a free transfer in 2023. Fox has largely been second choice during an injury-riddled spell in west London but has impressed when needed under Marti Cifuentes this term.

Fox has come in and out of the side as QPR have struggled with injuries but started all four matches of the winning run in January, scoring against Luton Town. Cifuentes has also defended the player in his trickier moments.

Following defeat to Portsmouth in October, he told West London Sport: “I trust Fox. I trust him a lot. He was very important for us last season, a brilliant professional. He will not be happy and I am not a guy who will come in here pointing. I can make better decisions. I take responsibility. He is a fantastic professional and I am sure that he will show it in the next games.”

In other news, How much Millwall and QPR have spent on agent fees compared to Leeds United and rivals.